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Facebook reportedly laying off thousands of employees

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Re: Facebook reportedly laying off thousands of employees

#51

Post by rvz »

fny wrote: post #23

Facebook employs over 58K people. This is not a big deal especially considering tech went on a * massive* hiring binge recently. [0] Facebook had a recruiting crisis in 2021: https://www.protocol.com/workplace/facebook-docs-hiring-recr... [1] Facebook aimed to hire 10K Europeans for metaverse in 2021: https://www.reuters.com/technology/facebook-plans-hire-10000... People underestimate just how much COVID and the rapi…

This exactly. Rather than falling for the headlines which many have done, the pandemic has shifted roles from the office to remote at $100K+ salaries and cheap money allowing this to be possible; but very unsustainably.

Now you have thousands of VC inflated startups and tech companies (including FAANMG) starting to do layoffs due to the market going the other direction. The majority of FAANMG companies including Meta will still be around regardless of the headlines where as the tens of thousands unprofitable VC-funded startups will realize that they need to be profitable 'now' to be able to survive for another decade or get another round of funding.

The tech 'hiring binge' of 2020 was going to go the other way soon enough. Even unsuprisingly.

Re: Facebook reportedly laying off thousands of employees

#52

Post by randomsearch »

rajman187 wrote: post #20
asciimov wrote: post #11

Does Facebook spend any sort of money on R&D? I just can't fathom a company that once had a near trillion dollar market cap, not spending any of their resources to try to find their next big revenue stream. They should have been able to pivot to a plan B, (or C,D,E... etc). If you point to their 3d ventures, well, I've never seen it in person, so they are doing a lousy job of marketing it.

RealityLabs is a $10billion initiative with only about $2 in revenue (Quest 2 headsets come from here). RealityLabs Research is a large component and indeed the major R&D investment. This was spun out during the 2021Q4 earnings call when the different sectors of the company were reported separately for the first time, following the name change to Meta.

Think the OP is say - over the long term not since the recent somewhat desperate pivot.

Similar to sibling comments: copying your competitors is not R&D, and neither is building a software library that’s an incremental improvement on an existing OSS library.

Re: Facebook reportedly laying off thousands of employees

#53

Post by kaptainscarlet »

martin_a wrote: post #43
username_my1 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Meta verse could be the next big thing and the long shot facebook needs. It just happened that out of their control 1. Apple squeezed them out of ads revenue 2. Market went to shit I hate Facebook as a company but I don’t see them making strategic mistakes…. Everyone is getting fired everywhere

> Metaverse could be the next big thing and the long shot facebook needs. I'm skeptical. With all their money and knowledge and whatnot, they've only managed to create something that looks like a dated console party game but not more. I don't see how that's the future. Furthermore, do they expect everyone to buy a... say... $400 headset to use the Metaverse? The low entry barrier was probably one of the biggest reaso…

Couldn't agree more. The headset at $400 will be a high barrier to entry. If the metaverse was built on top of the smartphone then it would get most probably pernetrate the market faster.

Re: Facebook reportedly laying off thousands of employees

#55

Post by randomsearch »

fortylove wrote: post #30

Seeing giants fall like this, where they achieve the highest peaks imaginable, but then struggle to find the next thing that is suitably big enough to satisfy expectations makes me never want to reach mega success status if I ever start a startup.

It’s like music. Most bands are capable of a great album, but the truly incredible artists can move from genre to genre constantly reinventing themselves.

To create an org that can do the latter (hello, Apple) seems incredible difficult, but it always seems to involve exceptionally creative leaders.

So the secret I think is to sell you mega status Facebook Borg and start afresh in a different area without the baggage of the previous app.

Re: Facebook reportedly laying off thousands of employees

#56

Post by fny »

randomsearch wrote: post #46
fny wrote: post #23

Facebook employs over 58K people. This is not a big deal especially considering tech went on a * massive* hiring binge recently. [0] Facebook had a recruiting crisis in 2021: https://www.protocol.com/workplace/facebook-docs-hiring-recr... [1] Facebook aimed to hire 10K Europeans for metaverse in 2021: https://www.reuters.com/technology/facebook-plans-hire-10000... People underestimate just how much COVID and the rapi…

12 000 people out of 58 000 is “not a big deal”? It’s especially a big deal in the context of Facebook’s decline and bleak outlook. They’ve been outcompeted by TikTok, and their bet on VR looks misguided. Facebook look doomed, and this is a big step in that direction.

They literally went on a hiring binge from 2020-2021, so... in my opinion, yes. Sure there's bleak outlook, but you have no idea how many people I know from different companies who jumped ship from some 2nd-3rd tier co to work for the big five or Zoom-like start up during COVID.

Mind you, there was binge hiring even outside of the big five. Many high profile startups increased their workforces by 10-20% in less than a year... and my God you have no idea how many dumbass crypto initiatives launched at the same time.

Re: Facebook reportedly laying off thousands of employees

#58

Post by bayraktar »

louistsi wrote: post #35
ohgodplsno wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"managing out" This is about the worst kind of doublespeak I have ever heard. It is actively malicious, the very thought of it brings images of purposeful abuse of employees. Seriously, just fire people.

Doesn't always mean the same thing, "managing out" could mean firing, but it could also mean creating an inhospitable environment for work, like demotion, allocating drudge work, removing responsibilities, etc. To manage them out of the company "by their own choice", which is unfortunately just as bad if not worse.

It could also mean creating an inhospitable environment for work, like demotion, allocating drudge work, removing responsibilities, etc.

Right - it's actually far worse than outright firing or laying off people. As in, genuinely harmful to people from a psychological (and hence physical) point of view. All so the company can save a few dollars, and hit certain quarterly targets a bit sooner.

That's why there's a name for it (since long before the "quiet" meme), and legal precedents that are supposed to prevent companies from doing this (if any of them would take heed, which of course they won't):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructive_dismissal

So the question to our friend thrwawayacc up above is -- OK, so this is what the director told you to do (and thanks for for sharing, BTW). But are you actually going to -- go through with what you were told to do? Are are you going to tell these people at the director level some version of:

I understand your concerns, and the financial position that the company in. But at the end of the day, this isn't the right way to go about conducting what everyone can plainly see it as -- a layoff. Ultimately, if we go this route, it will be harmful to the company's reputation and long-term growth -- but more importantly, it will cause genuine harm to people who, until now, have been considered part of the Amazon Family.

If Corporate insists on going this route, there's no way I can stop them of course. However, for my part, in my role, I will not be be able to participate in this extremely ill-advised course of action.

This is your moment. So what's it going to be?

Re: Facebook reportedly laying off thousands of employees

#59

Post by onion2k »

gregjor wrote: post #25
onion2k wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook stopped burning VC money a long time ago. They've been wildly profitable for years. Their success is largely because of paying high salaries to attract some of the best people, not in spite of doing that. The real issue seems to be that they're losing $3bn a quarter building the Metaverse (eg Reality Labs) at the same time as losing ad revenue because of things like Apple's antitracking changes and failing t…

"Best people" according to what metric, other than salary? Facebook got fat from advertising and monetizing the worst aspects of social media. Does that require the "best people?" What technology has Facebook developed with all of those "best people" that could compare to what Bell Labs did with a group of fewer than 10?

"Best people" according to what metric..

Any metric you like. Facebook is massive and has a huge range of people. There'll be people who sit in the top 0.1% for literally every method of ranking them you can dream up.

Re: Facebook reportedly laying off thousands of employees

#60

Post by mhoad »

jmathai wrote: post #27
noncoml wrote: post #3

Maybe Zuck should put himself on PIP as it’s obvious he needs support. He had a money printing machine and managed to fuck it up.

I worked at Yahoo! when the company offered to acquire Facebook for $1.4 billion. Most thought Zuck was a fool to pass on that. He 300x’d it in 10 years.

And just think all it took was a couple of genocides, breaking society and becoming one of the most despised people in the world.
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